To say that I went to sleep sounds incredible and I could not have believed it, if I had not been awakened by a terrific blow on the forehead.

  So violent was the impact that the post boy had been thrown from his seat. As for myself I was saved by the tilt of the chaise and the shock which awoke me was due to my forehead striking against the wicker work. It occurred to me then, that I had better ride on the box and put the post boy inside, but he raised strong objections to this idea, either because he did not understand my suggestion or because he imagined that by complying he would be neglecting his duty. So we made a fresh start, the post-boy continued his song and I my dance. About five o’clock in the morning we reached Selogorodetz where we made a halt for breakfast. Thank heaven another fifty leagues would see us at our journey’s end.

  I returned to my cage with a sigh and climbed on to my perch. Not till then did I think of asking if the cover of the chaise could be raised. They said it was the easiest thing in the world. I immediately ordered it to be done and from that moment only the lower half of my body felt incommoded.

  At Iouga I struck on an equally brilliant idea; this was to remove the seat, spread some straw in the bottom of the chaise and lie down on it with my portmanteau in place of a pillow. Thus one improvement led to another and my situation at length became almost endurable.

  My post boy insisted on drawing up before the Castle of Gatshina where Paul I. was confined during the whole of Queen Catherine’s reign, and then in front of the Tsarskoe-Selo Palace, the summer residence of the Emperor Alexander; but I was so fatigued that I was quite satisfied to merely glance at these two wonders, mentally resolving to pay them a future visit under more comfortable circumstances.

  As we were leaving Tsarskoe-Selo the axle tree of a drosky in front of us suddenly broke and the carriage without overturning fell on its side. As I was about a hundred yards behind the drosky, I had time, before overtaking it to see a gentleman alight, tall and thin, holding in one hand an opera hat and in the other a kit or miniature violin. He was wearing a black coat such as would have been fashionable in Paris in 1812, black knee breeches, black silk stockings and shoes with buckles. The moment he touched the ground, he began to stamp with his right leg, then with his left, then he cut capers on both and finally turned round three times to satisfy himself that no bones were broken. The anxiety he displayed regarding his safety induced me to stop and inquire if he had hurt himself.

  “No, sir, no,” said he, “except that I shall lose my lesson; a lesson which brings me in a louis, sir, and with the prettiest young lady in St. Petersburg, Mademoiselle de Vlodeck, who is acting the part of Philadelphia, one of Lord Warton’s daughters in Sir Anthony Van Dyck’s picture, at the fête to be given by the Court in honour of the hereditary Grand Duchess of Weimar/’

  “Sir,” I answered, “I do not quite understand what you say, but never mind, if I can be of any assistance to you?”

  “What, sir, if you can be of any assistance to me, why you can save my life! Just think, sir, I have been giving a dancing lesson to the Princess Lubormiska, whose country seat is close by. She is to represent Cornelia. A lesson worth two louis, sir, I never give them for less; I am all the rage and I am making hay while the sun shines. It is very simple, I am the only French dancing master in St. Petersburg. Now can you believe it, this rascal put me into a dilapidated carriage which very nearly disabled me; luckily my legs are all right. I have taken your number you scoundrel.”

  “If I am not mistaken, sir, the service I can render you is to offer you a place in my carriage,”

  “Yes, sir, you are quite right, it would be an immense service, but I am afraid.”

  “What, with a fellow countryman.”

  “You are a Frenchman, sir?”

  “And with a fellow artist.”

  “You are an artist? My dear sir, St. Petersburg is the worst town in the world for artists. Dancing too, particularly dancing, why, dancing is a one legged business. I suppose, sir, you do not happen to be a dancing master?”

  “What, they only dance on one leg! Why, you told me you were paid a louis a lesson; do they give you so much for teaching them to hop? A whole louis, sir, it seems to me that is pretty good pay.”

  “Well, yes, just now, considering the special circumstances, but Russia is no longer what she once was. The French have ruined her. I presume, sir, you are not a dancing master?”

  “I have been told that at St. Petersburg talent is always appreciated.”

  “Oh! yes, no doubt it was so once; why a wretched hairdresser has been known to earn 600 roubles a day while I can scarcely make 80. I trust you are not a dancing master.”

  “No, my dear fellow countryman,” I replied at last, pitying his distress, “and you may get into my chaise without any fear of encountering a rival.”

  “I accept your offer with the greatest pleasure,” cried my dancing friend, seating himself beside me, “Thanks to you I shall be at St. Petersburg in time to give my lesson.”

  The post boy set off at full gallop and three hours later, as night was falling, we entered St. Petersburg by the Moscow gate. Owing to the information rained upon me by my companion, who was wonderfully affable now that he felt sure I was not a dancing master, I got down at the Hôtel de Londres, in the Admiralty Square at the corner of Nevski Prospect. Here we parted; he jumped into a drosky and I entered the hotel.

  I need hardly say that though I was eager to explore Peter the Great’s city, I postponed the matter until the morrow. I felt literally broken in pieces and could barely support myself on my legs.

  With the utmost difficulty I crawled to my room, where fortunately I found a good bed, a luxury I had not experienced since leaving Vilna.

  I woke up the next day at noon, and the first thing I did was to rush to the window. In front of me was the Admiralty Palace, with its tall gilded spire surmounted by a ship and its girdle of trees; on my left was the Senate House; on my right the Winter Palace and the Hermitage; while in the spaces separating these splendid works of art I caught glimpses of the Neva which appeared to be as wide as the sea.

  I took my breakfast while dressing, and as soon as I was ready repaired to the Palace Quay and hurried along to the Troitskoï bridge, which, by the way, is eighteen hundred feet long. Here I had been advised to get my first impression of the city as a whole. It was the best piece of advice I have ever received.

  I very much doubt if there exists in the whole world such a panorama as that which displayed itself before my eyes, when, with my back to the Viborg quarter, I drank in the view as far as the Isles of Volnoï and the Gulf of Finland.

  Close at hand on my right, and moored like a ship by two light bridges to the Islet of Aptekarskoï, rose the Fortress, the earliest cradle of St. Petersburg, and from amidst its walls sprang the golden spire of the church of St. Peter and St. Paul, the mausoleum of the Czars, and the green roof of the Mint.

  Facing the Fortress and on the opposite bank I distinguished, beginning with the left, the Marble Palace, faulty chiefly because the architect seems to have forgotten to give it a façade; the Hermitage, the charming retreat which Catherine II. built herself as a refuge from state and ceremony; the Royal Winter Palace, remarkable more for its size than its proportions, for its height rather than its architecture; the Admiralty, with its two pavilions and granite staircases, — the imposing centre from which the three principal streets in St. Petersburg diverge; and lastly, beyond the Admiralty, the English Quay, with its magnificent mansions, ending in the New Admiralty.

  After feasting my eyes on this long line of majestic buildings I turned my attention to those in front of me. There at the extreme end of the Isle of Vasilievskoï, towered the Exchange, with its semi-circular staircases reaching to the water’s edge.

  Beyond on the bank facing the English Quay is the row of the twelve Colleges, with the Academies of Science and Fine Arts, and at the end of this magnificent vista, the School of Mines, situated at the extremity of the bend described by the river.

  On the other side of Basil Islet, — which derives its name from a lieutenant of Peter the Great to whom the Emperor entrusted affairs, while he himself, busied in building the Fortress, was living in his little hut on the Isle of St. Petersburg — flows in the direction of the Isles of Volnoï that branch of the river known as the Little Neva. Here in the midst of lovely gardens, enclosed in gilded railings and carpeted with flowers and shrubs imported from Africa and Italy for the three short months of summer enjoyed in St. Petersburg, and for the other nine months of the year shut up in hot-houses, here, I say, are situated the country residences of the St. Petersburg aristocracy. The whole of one of these islands is given up to the Empress, who has built a little palace there and changed the whole site with gardens and walks.

  Turn round and look up the river instead of down, the view changes in character but retains its grandeur. At the two ends of the bridge on which I was resting, stood on one bank the Church of the Trinity, and on the other the Summer gardens; on the left I noticed the little wooden hut, occupied by Peter the Great while he was building the Fortress. Near this cabin there is still a tree on which an image of the Virgin is nailed about ten feet from the ground. When the founder of St. Petersburg asked how high the river rose in the time of the highest floods, they showed him this image. At the sight of it he almost determined to abandon his gigantic enterprise. The sacred tree and the ever famous house are surrounded by arcades, intended to shelter from the action of the weather and the climate this commonplace looking hut, consisting of only three rooms: a dining-room, a parlour, and a bedroom. Peter was laying the foundations of a city, and had no time to build a fine house for himself.

  A little farther off, but still on the left hand, and on the other side of the Neva and old Petersburg, are the Military Hospital, the Academy of Medicine, and in the distance the village of Oklawith its suburbs; opposite these buildings, and on the right of the Horse Guards’ Barracks, are the Crimean Palace with its emerald roof, the Artillery Barracks, the Poor House, and the old Monastery of Smolna.

  I cannot say how long I stood entranced with this double panorama. Perhaps on further reflection all these palaces bore too close a resemblance to stage scenery, and all these columns, which from a distance seemed to be of marble, were perhaps nothing but pinchbeck brickwork, yet at a first glance they are simply marvellous, and easily surpass the highest expectations any one can have formed concerning them.

  Four o’clock struck. I had been told that dinner was served at half-past four, so turning my steps in the direction of the hotel with great reluctance, I passed in front of the Admiralty to get a better view of the colossal statue of Peter the Great, which I had noticed from my window.

  I had been so deeply engrossed in inspecting the buildings that I scarcely noticed the people until I was coming back, yet their well-marked characteristics are deserving of attention. In St. Petersburg everyone is a bearded yokel or a fine gentleman; there is no middle class.

  At a cursory glance the mujik, it must be confessed, not very interesting. In winter, sheepskins turned inside out; in summer, striped shirts dangling about their knees, instead of being tucked into their breeches, sandals fastened to their feet by thongs twisted round their legs, hair cut short and square at the nape of the neck, and faces hidden in bushy, unkempt beards, such are the men; pelisses of some common stuff or very voluminous jackets which half cover their petticoats, top boots so immense that feet and legs are hidden from view, so much for the women.

  It is true that in no other country in the world do the people bear such a serene expression upon their faces. Examine the countenances of any dozen people drawn from the dregs of Paris, six or seven at least will express suffering, dire poverty or fear. In St. Petersburg nothing of the kind. The serf, assured as to the future and usually satisfied with the present, does not trouble himself about food, dress or shelter, knowing that his master is bound to provide these things for him, and marches through life with nothing to dread but sundry floggings to which his shoulders have long since grown accustomed. Besides, he quickly forgets the lash, thanks to the disgusting vodki, his favourite drink; instead of exciting him, like the wine which intoxicates our street porters, it endows him with the deepest and humblest respect for his betters, the most tender regard for his equals, and the most comical and affecting goodwill towards every one.

  Here then are plenty of reasons for referring again to the mujik, and nothing but an unjust prejudice prevented me from speaking of him before.

  Another peculiarity which struck me was the ease with which traffic was conducted in the streets, thanks to the three great canals which encircle the city, for by their agency scavenging and household removals are an easy matter, and provisions and wood can be quickly brought in. There is never any obstruction caused by carts, such as would compel a carriage to take three hours on a journey that might be completed in ten minutes on foot.

  On the contrary plenty of room everywhere; in the streets are droskys, chaises, vehicles of every description, crossing in all directions at a breakneck speed, and yet the cry “Faster, faster” is heard on every side; the pavements are reserved for foot passengers, who are never run over, even though they seem to desire it, for so skilful are the Russian coachmen in stopping at full gallop that you would have to be smarter than the driver before an accident could happen to you.

  I was forgetting another precaution taken by the police to let pedestrians know that they are expected to keep to the footpaths. Unless they are shod like horses they find it dreadfully tiring to walk on the paved roads, which remind one of the abominable pavé of Lyons. St. Petersburg fully justifies the popular description given of her, — a dainty dame, superbly clad but vilely shod.

  Among the jewels presented to her by the Czars, one of the grandest is the statue of Peter the First, a gift from Catherine the Second. The Emperor is mounted on a mettled prancing steed, typical of the Muscovite nobility, who gave him so much trouble to subjugate, He is seated on a bear’s skin, representative of the state of barbarism in which he found his people. Then, to complete the allegory, when the statue was finished, except for its pedestal, they hauled to St. Petersburg a virgin block of granite, an emblem of the difficulties which the civilizer of the North had had to surmount. The following inscription is cut on the granite, with a translation in Russian on the other side: —

  PETRO PRIMO CATHERINA SECUNDA, 1782.

  Half-past four struck as I completed my third turn round the iron railing surrounding the monument; and I was obliged to leave the chef-d’oeuvre of my compatriot Falconnet, unless I liked to run the risk of losing my place at table.

  St. Petersburg is the finest provincial town I know.

  The news of my arrival had already got about, thanks to my fellow traveller; and as he could say nothing about me except that I was posting and that at any rate I was not a dancing master, the news had disconcerted the little French professional colony. Each displayed the same anxiety that my piroutte dancer had shown, fearful lest I should turn out to be a competitor or a rival.

  So my entry into the dining-room was the cause of a general commotion among the honourable guests at the table d’hôte, who nearly all belonged to the colony, and every one tried to find out to which profession I belonged by studying my appearance and my manners. Now this required an unusual degree of perspicacity, for I simply bowed and sat down.

  During soup, thanks to the demands of hunger and the respect due to a stranger, I maintained my incognito. But after the joint, curiosity could no longer be restrained, and my neighbour on the right opened the attack.

  “A stranger in St. Petersburg, I think, Sir?” said he, passing his glass to me and bowing.

  “I arrived last night,” I answered, filling his glass and likewise bowing.

  “Are you a fellow countryman, Sir?” said my left hand neighbour in a tone of assumed friendship.

  “I don’t know, Sir. I am a Parisian.”

  “And I belong to Tours, the garden of France, where the purest French is spoken, as no doubt you are aware. So I came to St. Petersburg to be an Utchitel.”

  “Excuse me, Sir,” said I, turning to my right hand neighbour, “but can you tell me what an Utchitel is?”

  “A dealer in participles,” replied my neighbour, in a most contemptuous manner.

  “You have not come in the same capacity, I hope,” interrupted the gentleman from Tours, “otherwise I would give you a piece of friendly advice and that is to return to France as quickly as possible.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the recent fair for schoolmasters at Moscow has been a failure.”

  “The fair for schoolmasters? “I cried in bewilderment.

  “Yes, Sir. Don’t you know that poor Monsieur Le Duc has lost half his business this season?”

  “Sir,” said I, again appealing to the gentleman on my right, “may I be allowed to inquire who and what this Monsieur Le Duc is?”

  “A worthy restaurant keeper, Sir, who has an agency for tutors, whom he lodges and charges according to their attainments. During the two great Russian festivals at Easter and Christmas, when the gentry are accustomed to repair to the capital, he opens his agency and claims a commission in addition to the charges which he makes for obtaining a situation for a tutor. Well, this year a third of his clients are still on his hands, and a sixth of those whom he had despatched into the country have been returned to him, so the poor fellow is almost bankrupt.”

  “Really.”

  “You see, Sir,” answered the Utchitel, “if you are here with the idea of taking pupils, you have hit on an unlucky moment, since gentlemen born in Touraine, that is in the province where the best French is spoken, find it hard to get a berth.”

  “You need not disturb yourself on my account,” I replied; “I belong to a totally different profession.”

  “Sir,” said my opposite neighbour, addressing me across the table with a Bordeaux accent of the most pronounced kind, “if you are a wine-merchant, it is only fair to tell you, it is a pitiful trade, no good at all.”

 

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